The Hunnewell Pinetum

Early this morning (March 21, 2012), if you'd been walking around Lake Waban in Wellesley, you would have run into me sketching this marvelously pruned pine tree in the Hunnewell Pinetum. The sun had just topped the slope (to the left in my drawing) and I was down on the shadowed lake shore path. Occasionally walkers and joggers would come along. Dogs would lope along too, their collars jangling. But mostly what I heard were the birds: robins, mockingbirds, sparrows and mallards out on the water. In the distance, on the far Northwest end of the lake, a pair of swans were making a ruckus. A breeze picked up and I rolled my sleeves down and noticed the high clouds of fog retreating. Such a beautiful morning!

If you look carefully, you'll notice a bird at the very tip-top of the pine tree. What a fine observatory: "Port out, Starboard Home!" eeeeeeeeeeee!

I've included a few other drawings of the garden and a photomontage taken one rainy day last year. I wasn't dressed for the weather and  it was miserable. So I decided at the least to trespass a little :-( and take some quick photos of the Pinetum from places the public is not allowed to go.

Here's a link to a short history of the Hunnewell Pinetum (pdf file). There's also a Wikipedia entry.

If you're curious about it and want to sketch there sometime, let me know; I'd love to show it to you!

Pine Tree at the Hunnewell Pinetum, Wellesley, Massachusetts
colored pencil
© 2012 Rob Dunlavey

when? A cold day is all I remember!

drawn from Tupelo Point on the Wellesley College campus
07-16-2011

also from Tupelo Point (using a gold colored pencil)
11-25-2011